The Play That Goes Wrong

The Play That Goes Wrong is a 2012 play by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields of Mischief Theatre Company. It won Best New Comedy at the 2015 Laurence Olivier Awards. As of April 2023, the play has been running continuously at the Duchess Theatre in London for 8 years, and since 2014, the play has undertaken five UK tours.

History

London

The Play That Goes Wrong was written by Henry Lewis, Henry Shields and Jonathan Sayer while the trio were living together after drama school. The first production was staged at The Old Red Lion pub theatre in Islington, London. The initial run was from 4th to 31st December 2012. In 2013, the play had another run at the Old Red Lion, from 12th to 30th March. It then ran twice at the Trafalgar Studios, from 30th April to 1st June and from 2nd to 20th July. Later this year, a second act was added to the play ahead of the UK tour in 2014.

After the first UK tour, the production moved into the Duchess Theatre in the West End, beginning previews on 5th September and opening on 14th September 2014. The original cast left the show on 18th August 2015 and were succeeded by a new cast, which contained several members of Mischief Theatre including Harry Kershaw, Niall Ransome and Bryony Corrigan. The third cast began performances on 29th June 2016. The original cast returned to the show for 2 weeks in February 2017 ahead of their Broadway transfer. The fourth cast joined the show on 10th May 2017.

UK Tours

The first UK tour of The Play That Goes Wrong began on 21st January 2014 at the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury. The tour visited seventeen venues around the UK before concluding in Darlington on 21st June.

The second UK tour started at Theatre Royal Bath on 10th January 2017 and played at 30 venues in the UK and Ireland before finishing in Canterbury. Most of the cast from this tour then went into the West End production, starting on 28th March 2018.

After closures due to Covid-19, the play reopened at the Duchess Theatre on 9th December 2020, before being forced to close on 16th December due to government guidance. The show reopened on 18th June 2021 with a new cast.

Summary

For the goes right version see: The Murder At Haversham Manor

The fictitious Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society (Cornley University in the American version), fresh from such hits as The Lion and The Wardrobe, Cat, and James and the Peach (or James, Where's your Peach?), has received a substantial bequest and is putting on a performance of The Murder at Haversham Manor – a 1920s murder mystery play, similar to The Mousetrap, which has the right number of parts for the members.

The script was written by the fictitious Susie H. K. Brideswell. During the performance, a play within a play, a plethora of disasters befall the cast, including doors sticking, props falling from the walls, and floors collapsing. Cast members are seen misplacing props, forgetting lines (in one scene, an actor repeats an earlier line of dialogue and causes the dialogue sequence triggered by that line to be repeated, ever more frenetically, several times), missing cues, breaking character, having to drink white spirit instead of whisky (paint thinner in the U.S. production), mispronouncing words, stepping on fingers, being hidden in a grandfather clock, and being manhandled off stage, with one cast member (Sandra, playing Florence) being knocked unconscious and her replacement (Annie, the group technician) refusing to yield when she returns. Trevor, the play's lighting and sound operator will play music at inappropriate times and miss some of his cues. The climax is a tribute to a scene in Buster Keaton's film Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928), when virtually the whole of the remaining set collapses.

The Set

Most versions of The Play that Goes Wrong will have some or all of the following elements:

The primary set is Charles Haversham's private quarters, the lounge of Haversham Manor. It contains a chaise longue, a grandfather clock, an end table, and a fireplace. The fireplace is intended to have a mantelpiece, but the crew is unable to attach it before the show begins, so it is scrapped. Over the fireplace hangs a large portrait - ostensibly of Charles's father, but in reality a fancy portrait of a dog. There are several bookshelves painted into the walls, one of which is a secret revolving door. On one of the walls is a large window, covered by curtains, which opens onto backstage.

To one side of the lounge is a cantilevered platform representing the house's upstairs study. The platform is held up by a single pillar. On it stands a desk, a liquor cabinet, and some other decorative items. There is a door leading to the platform from offstage, as well as an "elevator" door that leads down to the lounge via an unseen mechanical lift of some kind. A speaking tube also hangs on the wall, connecting to a matching tube in the lounge.

Trevor's tech table may be its own part of the set; it is usually located somewhere visible to the audience, such as to the side of the stage.

Full Synopsis

(This is the goes wrong script; For the goes right version see: The Murder At Haversham Manor)

Pre-show

Before the play starts, the audience see the backstage staff doing last-minute adjustments to the set, including trying to mend a broken mantelpiece and find a dog (Winston) that has run off. The stage crew, particularly Annie Twilloil, will ask audience members for help, but is ultimately unable to secure the mantelpiece the wall. Finally, Trevor Watson, the technical director, tells them to give it up. He instructs the audience to turn off their cell phones, then asks them to help him find his Duran Duran CD boxset, before returning to his tech booth.

Chris Bean, the director, comes on stage to give a preamble to the audience. He expresses the Cornley Society's excitement at finally having the opportunity to put on a show with the right number of parts for the right number of cast members, listing several unfortunate shows from previous years such as "The Lion and the Wardrobe" and their summer musical, "Cat".

Act One

As the lights come up on set, they catch Jonathan Harris, playing Charles Haversham, crawling across the floor on his way to the chaise longue in the middle of the room. The lights go black again, and come up once more on Jonathan, now playing dead on the chaise.

Outside the room, Thomas Colleymore (Robert Grove) and Perkins (Dennis Tyde) can be heard calling for Charles. When he doesn't answer, the two of them attempt to enter the room through the door, which, despite their best efforts, remains firmly stuck shut. After some struggle, Robert and Dennis are forced to enter from the side of the set. The two realize that Charles is dead, though Jonathan struggles to remain convincingly so as other actors accidentally step on his hand, sit on his legs, and spit and hit him in the face several times throughout the scene. Dennis is seen struggling to remember his lines and reading difficult words from his hand, frequently mispronouncing them. Thomas suggests that they call the nearby Inspector Carter at once to help deal with the murder.

Thomas orders everyone in the house to assemble in Charles's private quarters. They are soon joined by Florence Colleymore (Sandra Wilkinson), who, unable to enter through the stuck door, delivers her opening lines through the room's window instead. Next, Cecil Haversham (Max Bennett) enters, briefly joined by members of the crew as they finally manage to force the door open. Upon seeing the audience, Max immediately becomes giddy and hams up his performance, soaking up their every reaction. Assembled together, Thomas, Cecil, Florence, and Perkins discuss Charles's death. Florence is distraught, and Thomas and Cecil remark that she is having "one of her hysterical episodes" and offer her pills to calm down. Perkins fetches the group a bottle of "scotch", but due to a prop mix-up, serves everyone something flammable and corrosive instead (white spirits or paint thinner).

Inspector Carter (Chris Bean) arrives and orders Thomas to remove Charles's body to the upstairs study. Robert and Dennis bring in a stretcher, unceremoniously roll Jonathan onto it, then attempt to pick it up; the fabric rips, leaving Jonathan on the floor. Robert and Dennis continue to mime carrying Jonathan out, and Chris follows, regretfully saying that he is leaving to "examine the body". When they have gone, Jonathan awkwardly makes his way out of the room after them, leaving Cecil and Florence (Max and Sandra) alone to continue their scene. Cecil and Florence discuss their secret affair, while Charles, Thomas, and Perkins examine the "body" on the tiny platform representing the study. Jonathan hastily makes his way onto the platform with the others and lies down to play dead, only to suffer a coughing fit as fingerprint powder is poured in his face and fall off the platform halfway through the scene, to everyone's terror. He once again is forced to awkwardly leave Charles's room while the others finish out the scene.

During his scene with Sandra, Max sits on the chaise and finds a ledger concealed under a cushion. Confused, he quickly hides it again underneath the couch. Cecil and Florence begin to make romantic overtures in the others' absence, but are interrupted several times as Thomas and Perkins re-enter the room to collect things for the Inspector. First, Robert comes for a pencil, but not finding it, picks up a set of keys instead. Next, Dennis, coming for the keys, is forced to grab a notebook. Finally, Robert comes back for the notebook, and dejectedly leaves with a vase of flowers. Max and Sandra continue their scene, but panic as Sandra's cue line - "Kiss me, Cecil! I can't wait a moment longer!" - goes uninterrupted several times, and the two are reluctantly faced with improvising a kiss. Finally, their cast members burst in.

Inspector Carter announces he will now interview the suspects alone, beginning with Perkins. During his interview, Dennis flubs some of his lines, accidentally claiming to have worked for Charles for "eighty" (not eight) years. There are also several references to objects being placed on the "mantelpiece" in the script. As there is no mantelpiece, Annie punches her hands (and, accidentally, her face) through the set to hold objects instead. Next, Carter interrogates Florence, putting pressure on her by telling her he knows about her affair and suggesting it could be a motive for murder. The two momentarily begin to deliver their lines out of sequence before Chris is able to set things straight again. As Sandra posts up against the wall dramatically, Robert flings the door open, hitting her and knocking her unconscious onto the floor. He, Chris, and Max, at a loss for what to do, continue to deliver their lines as if nothing has happened. Robert blithely declares "She's run off," before leaving Chris and Max to perform their interview. While Chris and Max are having their dialogue, several members of the cast and crew can be seen reaching through the window in the background, attempting to inconspicuously grab the unconscious Sandra. It soon turns into a spectacle, however, with Sandra being yanked against the wall and her dress constantly riding up. Finally, they are able to pull her out of the room.

Inspector Carter sends Cecil to get Thomas, and while he's alone, sits down on the chaise, where he suddenly "discovers" a ledger - though, because Max moved it, Chris is unable to actually find it. As he searches for it, members of the audience may call out to tell him where it is, to which he will respond with angry remarks about breaking the fourth wall. Cecil and Thomas return, but the Inspector leaves to study the ledger further. When he leaves, several objects fall from the walls, and Max and Robert attempt to hold them back up as they give their dialogue. While they are doing so, the phone rings, leading to an awkward dance of attempting to pick up the phone receiver with no hands. Thomas speaks with his accountant on the phone. Afterwards, Cecil confesses his affair to Thomas. Thomas responds with fury, letting go of the objects on the walls, which miraculously stay in place. The conversation becomes heated, leading to a poorly choreographed stage fight using two prop swords. Max's sword breaks, but he and Robert continue the fight, making "ching" sounds with their mouths. Next, Robert's sword gets stuck through the bottom of the study platform, nearly missing Chris. The fight goes on, and finally Robert mimes dealing a final slash to Max, who begins to "bleed" (using a red scarf) dramatically. Thomas hurls Cecil from the room.

Moments later, gunshots are heard offstage, and the Inspector, Thomas, and Perkins rush into Charles's room to see what's happened. Cecil bursts in with gunshot wounds in his back and collapses on the chaise. Suddenly, Florence - now played by a reluctant Annie Twilloil, who is pushed onstage in Florence's dress and with a script in her hands - bursts into the room. Florence expresses dismay at seeing Cecil dead, which Annie delivers in an anxious monotone. The Inspector once again orders Thomas and Perkins to remove the body from the room. Robert and Dennis return with the same broken stretcher from before, but are able to use it to carry Max (poorly playing a corpse while mugging at the audience) off stage. With everyone gone, Inspector Carter urges Florence not to have another "episode". Chris, on the other hand, quietly urges Annie to "have an episode", which she finally, grudgingly, does.

Thomas and Perkins return to the lounge, and the four characters discuss who could have killed Cecil. While they are doing so, Dennis forgets a line, instead repeating his line from earlier in the scene. This forces Chris, Annie, Robert, and Dennis into a dialogue loop which happens several times, to the actors' increasing agitation - particularly Robert, who is forced to take a sip of "scotch" every time the scene restarts. Finally, after much urging, Dennis is able to remember his real line, stating that "no one" could have killed Cecil other than the four people in the room. Annie closes out the scene by accidentally reading "Blackout, intermission" aloud from her script.

Act Two

Before the act begins in earnest, the crew can be seen and heard desperately restoring the parts of the set that have fallen down. Chris gives another short preamble, thanking the audience for returning for the second act and apologizing for the "minor" mistakes they may or may not have noticed.

The second act picks up where the first left off - with Inspector Carter, Thomas, Perkins, and Florence realizing the murderer is one of them. Just as the scene begins, everything that the crew put back up falls back down again, forcing the actors to hurriedly pick everything up and remove it from the stage in defeat.

Inspector Carter leaves to investigate the library. While Thomas, Perkins, and Florence are continuing their dialogue, Annie is more confident in the role, but suddenly trips, dropping her script and sending pages flying. The three struggle to keep the scene going as Annie frantically attempts to put her script back together and find her lines, leading to improvised dialogue that is completely nonsensical. The Inspector calls for Thomas in the upstairs study. Robert attempts to take the elevator up to the platform, which breaks down, and instead has to climb his way up with Dennis's help. With Florence and Perkins now alone, there's a knock at the door, and Perkins suggests that Florence should get somewhere safe. He leads her to a secret rotating wall behind a bookcase. Dennis and Sandra have trouble controlling the revolving door, leading them to switch places through it several times, and Trevor is accidentally thrown through it onto the set. In a panic, he hides himself inside the room's grandfather clock.

Finally free from the revolving door, Perkins answers the door, revealing that the visitor is Arthur the Gardener, who had supposedly left for the night. Arthur is played by Max, who immediately begins his crowd-pleasing shenanigans again. In lieu of an actual dog to play Winston the guard dog, Max holds an empty leash and mimics the dog being there. Getting overenthusiastic with his movements, Max accidentally knocks into the singular post holding up the upstairs platform, causing the entire thing to tilt suddenly downwards with Chris and Robert still on it. Looking for escape, they try the door to the study, but the doorknob comes off. Next, they consider taking the elevator, which is now unusable. Trapped, they cling on for their lives while Max and Dennis anxiously continue their scene. Arthur shows Perkins a piece of evidence he discovered - a handkerchief with the initials F.C. and traces of cyanide, implicating Florence Colleymore. Perkins calls Florence back into the room.

Still struggling not to fall off the collapsing second floor, Inspector Carter reveals to Thomas that before his death, Charles willed everything that he had to Perkins, implying that Perkins must be the murderer. The two agree that they must head downstairs, before quickly realizing the only way to do that is to jump from the platform. Robert remains behind to keep the furniture on the platform from falling, while Chris mimes "going downstairs" and ungraciously drops to the stage. Suddenly, the phone rings. Arthur answers, and announces, with dawning concern, that it's for Thomas - ostensibly in the room but, in reality, still on the second floor. The cast, desperate for a work-around, hold hands to form a line from the phone to Robert, who pretends to speak into Chris's hand as a "phone". After Thomas "hangs up", the crew manages to get the door open to the second floor, and Robert passes all the furniture out to them before exiting himself.

With Thomas gone from the room, Perkins and Arthur reveal their suspicions of Florence to the Inspector. Florence is horrified, and Annie, now fully invested in the part, crosses the room to post up against the wall, where she is once again knocked unconscious by the door as Robert flings it open. Chris, Max, Robert, and Dennis pick up Annie's unconscious body and sit it on the windowsill as they try to continue their dialogue with Florence. However, they suddenly hear a response from off stage: Sandra is conscious again and has reappeared to continue her role. Since Annie is wearing her dress, Sandra comes on stage in only undergarments, much to Max's discomfort. Chris and Robert drop Annie out the window and resume the scene.

The Inspector, Thomas, and Perkins leave the room to examine Cecil's body, leaving Florence alone with Arthur. As soon as they are alone, Florence attempts to seduce Arthur, but Sandra is thwarted by Max's resistance to the intimacy. In a dramatic moment, Florence falls against the grandfather clock, startling Trevor (still inside), who flings the door open, knocking her unconscious again. Trevor and Max, panicking, pick up Sandra and hide her inside the clock. Once again finding himself without a Florence to play off of, Max picks up Annie's script and hands it to Trevor, who stubbornly takes over Florence's lines. He is quickly flummoxed, however, as he realizes that the dialogue requires him to kiss Max. He is, at first, averse to it, insisting that no one in the audience would want to see that, but finally agrees, sometimes thanks to pressure from the audience. The two kiss, at which point Chris, Robert, and Dennis burst back into the room and are baffled.

Continuing to follow the script, Inspector Carter and Thomas now level their accusation at Florence based on Arthur's evidence. Chris once again prompts Trevor to "have an episode". Trevor stubbornly obliges, before getting a little too into it and falling underneath the second floor platform, which then collapses the rest of the way onto him. Before long, though, Florence's lines are heard again - from inside the grandfather clock this time. Sandra (as Florence) exclaims that she "shall faint", but is unable to get out of the grandfather clock, so Chris and Max pick up the clock itself and lay it down on the chaise longue. They continue the scene as if the clock itself were Florence. Arthur is asked if he can identify Florence as the figure he saw drop the handkerchief, to which he responds that she wasn't. Inspector Carter then accuses Perkins, and orders that he be handcuffed to the chaise longue. In the meantime, Annie creeps back onstage and lies down on top of the clock to resume playing Florence, but is knocked off as Sandra bursts free from the clock. The two of them battle ferociously over Florence's lines for the rest of the play, attempting to get one another out of the way.

Perkins makes his own accusation - of Inspector Carter himself, who he reveals has been embezzling funds from the police. Realizing he's been made, the Inspector draws his pistol, only to be interrupted by the appearance of Charles, miraculously alive and wielding a shotgun. (Jonathan, who made this exact entrance twice already earlier in the play, has finally gotten his cue right.) Charles quickly takes control of the situation, holding up the Inspector. He also frees Perkins from the handcuffs - only, no one actually has the key to the handcuffs, so Dennis remains chained to the chaise longue for the rest of the play. Charles goes over the details of the murders and the Inspector's crimes, and Thomas is revealed to be an accomplice. The last moments of the play devolve into complete chaos: the two Florences are fighting each other, Trevor crawls out of the wreckage of the set and declares it a "fucking death trap", Dennis is forced to drag the chaise longue from room to room, and finally, to top it all, the walls of the set come crashing down, barely missing the actors.

Things begin to settle as the actors enter the last scene of the play. The Inspector has been shot dead, and Arthur, Perkins, and Florence have left the room, leaving only Thomas and Charles. Charles offers Thomas a glass of sherry, which Thomas readily accepts. Charles then asks Thomas what he thinks Charles did with the poisoned sherry that had been meant for him. Thomas, in shock, realizes he's been poisoned. Here, Robert calls for his line, to which Trevor responds "Just die already." Robert is irritated, but then proceeds to "die" in an extremely drawn-out and melodramatic manner. With that, Charles delivers his final monologue, saying "Let us hope we never again see a murder at Haversham Manor."

Gallery

Cast

Casts

UK Casts

• Original Off-West End
• West End Casts
• UK Tour Casts

Character	Old Red Lion (2012)	Old Red Lion (2013)	Trafalgar Studios (run 1) (2013)	Trafalgar Studios (run 2) (2013)
Chris	Henry Shields
Robert	Henry Lewis	Greg Tannahill	Henry Lewis
Dennis	Jonathan Sayer
Max	Dave Hearn
Sandra	Charlie Russell	Lotti Maddox		Charlie Russell
Jonathan	Stephen Leask	Henry Lewis	Joshua Elliott	Greg Tannahill
Annie	Nancy Zamit
Trevor	-	-	--	-
Understudies/ASMs	-

Character	Original Cast (2014-15)	Second Cast (2015-16)	Third Cast (2016-17)	Fourth Cast (2017-18)	Fifth Cast (2018-19)	Sixth Cast (2019-20)	Seventh Cast (2021-22)
Chris	Henry Shields	Harry Kershaw	Hayden Wood	Jack Baldwin	Patrick Warner	Jake Curran	Ross Green
Robert	Henry Lewis	Leonard Cook	Adam Byron	Leonard Cook	Edward Judge	Kazeem Tosin Amore	David Kirkbride
Dennis	Jonathan Sayer	Niall Ransome	Drew Dillon	Sydney K Smith	Edward Howells	Benjamin McMahon	Michael Keane
Max	Dave Hearn	James Marlowe	Daniel Millar	George Haynes	Alastair Kirton	Bobby Hirston	Jack Michael Stacey
Sandra	Charlie Russell	Bryony Corrigan	April Hughes	Katy Daghorn	Meg Mortell	Elena Valentine	Ellie Morris
Jonathan	Greg Tannahill	Laurence Pears	Oliver Llewellyn-Jenkins	Fred Gray	Jason Callendar	Steven Rostance	Elan James
Annie	Nancy Zamit	Laura Kirman	Joanne Ferguson	Lindsey Scott	Katie Bernstein	Catherine Dryden	Ciara Morris
Trevor	Rob Falconer	Chris Leask	Fred Gray	Daniel Poyser	Graeme Rooney	Gabriel Paul	Blayar Benn
Understudies /ASMs		Adam Byron, Matt Cavendish, April Hughes, Sarah Madigan	Adam Boakes, Katy Daghorn, George Haynes, Lindsey Scott	Tom Babbage, Jamie Birkett, Sean Carey, Beth Lilly	Natasha Culley, Matthew Howell, Helana Muir, James Watterson	David Kristopher Brown, Liam Horrigan, Matthew Howell, Louisa Sexton, Laura White	Rosemarie Akwafo, Euan Bennet, Colin Burnicle, Sally Cheng, Oliver Clayton

Character	First UK Tour (2014)	Second UK Tour (2017)	Third UK Tour (2018)	Fourth UK Tour (2021)	Fifth UK Tour (2022)
Chris		Patrick Warner
Robert		Edward Judge
Dennis		Edward Howells
Max		Alastair Kirton
Sandra		Meg Mortell
Jonathan		Jason Callender
Annie		Katie Bernstein
Trevor		Graeme Rooney
Understudies/ASMs